Reading Time: < 1 min I’ve talked a few times about my big reading shortcut, and how I can spend less than an hour to extract almost all of the best information from almost any book. It works amazingly well, but it’s a very focused hour to get it done (20 minutes reading, 20 minutes pulling more quotes, 20 minutes […]
Productivity
Should you be scheduling more emails?
Reading Time: 2 min A few years ago, Gmail added a nifty feature tucked into the main “Send” button to “Schedule Send”. Pressing that button will open a prompt for when you want to send it, and then it essentially hides the email and sends it at the appropriate time. I use this feature occasionally, but an article from […]
An overwhelming number of inputs
Reading Time: 2 min We have a lot of things being thrown our way. In a typical day, most of us will have to deal with requests coming via email, text messages, social media, to-do lists and a variety of other places. It can be a lot! As Khe Hy said in a recent post, many of us often […]
Efficient isn’t the same as effective
Reading Time: < 1 min I strive to be a very efficient person, as evidenced by the well over 100 posts in the “productivity” category of this blog. I try to be careful, though, as efficiency has very little to do with being effective, and the latter is far more important. Kevin Paul Scott laid this out beautifully in a […]
Where did that time come from?
Reading Time: 2 min When people say they don’t have time to exercise, visit with friends, or just relax, they’re likely telling the truth. Their calendar is full and things can get tight. A big (somewhat hidden) reason for this is social media, which on average consumes nearly 2-1/2 hours every single day (source). Where did that time come […]
Run more parity checks
Reading Time: 2 min In computing, a parity check is “the process that ensures accurate data transmission between nodes during communication“. In other words, it’s a simple test that will help make sure that the data being sent is the same as the data being received and that nothing was lost along the way. They’re imperfect checks, but they’ll […]
Mise en place for better writing
Reading Time: < 1 min When I cook, which is fairly rarely, I try to follow the French concept of mise en place, where you have everything prepped and ready to go before you actually start. Given my weak cooking skills, it’s very helpful to do that. I’m finding that writing works best for me when I follow the same […]
Being overprepared can make things look easy
Reading Time: 2 min If I need to travel to a business that I’ve never been to before, I almost always scout it on Google Maps Street View first, so I have some idea what I’m looking for. Just a few weeks ago, this habit paid off when I discovered that I had the address wrong and would have […]
Get rid of busy and leave productive
Reading Time: < 1 min When it comes to your workday, it’s often filled with two types of work: Things that keep you busy Things that are productive I was recently talking to someone that had brought in a consultant to help them streamline their manufacturing, and he dropped a great quote on me. Their goal was to become more […]
Manage your time or your energy
Reading Time: < 1 min I’m a big advocate of time management, and have well over 100 posts on here about productivity of various forms. When you get down to it, though, your time isn’t what you need to manage — it’s your energy. In the his book “The Personal MBA“, author Josh Kaufman puts it this way: Here’s the […]